12.30.2005

We just finished our annual Messiah Sing-in, held at our house. It was quite fun and everyone had a good time. We even had some really good cake, after eating the venison stew!

I put all of the Messiah on my iPod for easy reference so that we could sing along to it.

Our Sing-in is extremely informal, the point is the food, getting back together, and mainly having fun. We never sing professionally or anything, it's mainly just hollering through the Hallelujah Chorus that we end up doing. The kids, the adults, and the pets all have fun on this day.

If you are one of my friends and are interested in doing this next year, don't forget to call me about it just after Christmas! Come to our house and scream your lungs out, eat wonderful food, talk, and have a great time!

10.08.2005

But why? Rain is good for us. Without it we could not live. I always love rainstorms (perhaps it's just because I was born in a thunderstorm), but why do people complain? Getting wet seems fun to me, and it's just water. It feels good too, in my opinion.

And anyway, what about those nights where you can't sleep and then suddenly you realize that it's raining lightly, and it lulls you to sleep?

And what about those times when it's raining, and you have the lights on, playing a game of Boggle together? Rain strengthens family relationships, and gives you a feeling of cozyness, inside.

Lastly, we all need something that we don't like. Why? It would be boring without rain.

When you join or give to the Sierra Club you will have the satisfaction of knowing that you are helping to preserve irreplaceable wildlands, save endangered and threatened wildlife, and protect this fragile environment we call home.

So go ahead. It's only a small amount of money. Plus, with the membership you get:

Sierra magazine is a wonderful thing to receive every other month. Below are an excerpt and a quote, as well as a photo, from it.

SIERRA CLUB BULLETIN

Five Ways to Take the InitiativeBY JENNIFER HATTAM

Imagine a country free from pollution, where communities are healthy, wildlands are protected, and every citizen has the power to help keep things that way. If that sounds implausible in today's political climate, don't worry. Visionary ideas often do. But this greener future is achievable if everyone works together.

Since the 2004 election, Sierra Club leaders have been doing some soul-searching. While close to 70 percent of Americans agree with most of the Club's values, only 20 percent identify as strong environmentalists. That's a disappointing fact, but it also presents an opportunity. If we are able to explain what the Club stands for without resorting to technical terms or eco-speak, we can build an unstoppable force for conservation. That doesn't mean abandoning the causes we've worked hard on for so many years, but restating them in terms of goals a majority of Americans can share:

GET THE POISONS OUT of our water and air by enforcing existing pollution laws and making polluters clean up after themselves and reduce dangerous emissions; CHOOSE CLEAN ENERGY for our homes and cars by encouraging use of renewable electricity and the raising of fuel-economy standards; BUILD BETTER COMMUNITIES that are safer for cyclists and pedestrians by keeping public-transit systems strong and sprawl at bay; PROTECT NATURE for the next generation by designating public lands as parks and wilderness areas, restoring native species, and creating open spaces for people to enjoy; and EXERCISE DEMOCRACY by speaking out in our communities to improve the environment in all these ways and more.

These ideas tap into basic American values of fairness, opportunity, and progress. No matter where we live, we all want safe and healthy neighborhoods. We all want nature close by and a say in how our communities grow. And we all want neighbors who will work with us to protect what we love. So let's get started.

8.18.2005

If you're like me, you want to protect the environment. So you should. Just go towww.savebiogems.organd write e-mails to the government and to companies to stop things like:

Oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

Logging in various rainforests

Mining around the Everglades

And more!

E-mail-writing is free, and they even give you a pre-written note to send that you can change or keep the same. They also accept donations.

After clicking HERE or above, just pick a 'biogem' to save and sign up! They even give you 'action credits' for taking action and you can get cool stuff like wallpaper, a screen saver, and a start page.

I have finally created my first motion picture (okay, okay, my brother helped me and it's just a short film).

It's called Lucy in the Sky with Aliens (silly title, right?) and it's about an astral body that borrows the body of a dog (played by my dog, Lucy) to check out Earth. If you are someone to whom I have given my e-mail address, e-mail me and I will find a way to give you a copy!

I'm working on another movie with my sister's friend (she wrote it and I'm filming/editing it for her), and we'll see how that goes.

I just got a new computer and I love it! It's an eMac, which is related to my old 1st-gen iMac. It's a G4 with 1.25 GHz and has a 32MB graphics card.

It has a bigger screen (1280 x 960) than my old Mac (1024 x 768), and is much faster.

Plus, it has a DVD burner (I haven't yet got it to work), and a CD burner.

My parents gave the computer to our family for my birthday, a kind of strange thing to do, but it works.

My computer comes with iLife '05, too!

Now my dad and I can play X-plane (flight-simulation software which our old computer never came close to running) and Sim City 4, which is arriving in the mail within 2 business days at our house. Also, all of the 3D games that I have are no longer jerky, something that I took for granted on my old G3 iMac.

7.25.2005

The Scarlet Pimpernel is a great read. It has a bit of romance, and a lot of mystery.

It's about a man who saves aristocrats from the French Revolution, and from being killed by the guillotine. He is placed in grave danger, but as yet he has slipped through the web that the people of the Revolution have made for him, using many different disguises! Can he outwit the French this time?

You probably wonder: Who is the Scarlet Pimpernel anyway? You'll have to read the book to find that out!

Go to amazon.com and take a look at what people say about this book by clicking HERE! You'll find other reviews and descriptions.

7.07.2005

Fortune cookies are interesting things. I have at least three strange stories about them.

Here are the ones I remember:

I went into a chinese food place with my dad. He said something like, "I've been having the same thing over and over again. I think it's time I tried something new."

After he'd eaten his food (something he hadn't had before), his fortune read:

Now is the time to try something new.

Once my fortune read:

It is a nice day.

Some fortune!

I had eaten chinese food earlier, and as I rummaged through my pocket, I came across three dollars that I had forgotten were there. Underneath them was my fortune from before:

Great wealth is in store for you.

Sometimes I wonder if the people who serve you chinese food see you and choose from a list of different fortunes depending on how you look, but that wouldn't explain the 'great wealth' fortune because I got it during my music camp and chose it from a bag of a whole bunch. The guy never even saw me, either!

Ampersands ( & ) are very interesting. They mean 'and,' of course, but according to Wikipedia, and my correct guess, they evolved from the Latin Et(which means and). You can see this by looking at this picture: On the left the & is stylized, but on the right, it's easily recognizable as Et.

6.29.2005

You know what I hate? I hate ads and commercials. They control your mind. They make you buy things. And they also give the rich advantages.

I know, I know, it makes money, but still, it's too much!

You can protest ads by simply turning off the TV or radio when they come on. I always do this. You should try it some time. It's really a relief. And you can talk to the people that are next to you if they are.

Ads are nothing but marketing, so why in the world would anyone listen to them?

6.28.2005

A lonely woman stands on a mountain path, an alien of the planet. She is stranded here. Her wild hair blows in the cold night wind as she looks down at a town nestled in the valley of four mountains. She sees a medley of houses, a few with lights, welcoming her. But will the people inside be welcoming? This is the question she needs to know the answer to.

She has no choice but to descend down from the mountains, to the civilization she knows nothing of. She is hungry, and needs lodging. She follows a path not traversed by many.

Late one autumn night Ernie Fleisher was watching a Sunday night movie with his wife. “Oh look, this is my favorite part!” he exclaimed, pointing to a lady on the TV who seemed very frightened indeed.

The doorbell rang.

“I’ll get it,” Ernie sighed when his wife, who was a beautiful but very lazy woman, made no motion to get up. He strode towards the door, grumbling.

When he opened the door, he saw a frightening woman with tangled hair and outlandish dress.

“And what, may I ask, is that supposed to mean?” He growled. “Get off of my property now or I’ll call the police!” He slammed the door and went back to the TV.

“Sometimes those tourists can be really strange, you know? Barging onto my doorstep with that costume on and talking nonsense! And in the middle of the night! How outrageous can you get? And look,” he said, pointing to the screen again, “I missed the best part!”

The woman looks up at a sky dotted with stars in a pattern unfamiliar to her. It isn’t working. She must persist, however, or else she will starve.

She reaches the third door, and says, to a man with curiosity on his face, once more, “Je’le malen an jel’ena deten-ende! Ene jen lahen jel?” She is not acknowledged.

She sighs a bitter sigh, and as a last effort, tries using her hands to explain her plight. But she is so tired that she faints. The man catches her fall and brings her inside.

• • •

The woman has no choice but to stay. Where else would she go? She tells the man her story, making signs with her hands, pointing to things, and drawing pictures. They like each other, but eventually, this friendship turns into love. Then, the man proposes, and the woman has to be explained the concept of earth-marriage. When she understands she says yes, and they do get married, in a small ceremony with just a few guests.

Some months pass, and the woman bears a child. At the hospital, the woman speaks. She has learned the English language a little bit after living with the man. She says, “I have a name for him....”

This is just the prologue of the very long novel I am trying to write. Please comment about it.

What an excellent web browser! Firefox includes features to block spyware and pop-up ads, comes with an integrated search bar which allows you to search many different sites (including Google, Yahoo, and Amazon.com), and lets you download different Themes to change its look. It also lets you install Extensions such as Forcastfox, StumbleUpon, and Adblock. These Extensions appear on the toolbars of the browser and let you see and do various things.

Of the extensions I downloaded, I liked Adblock and StumbleUpon the most. Adblock lets you get rid of annoying ads on various web pages by simply right-clicking (you hold the mouse button down or Ctrl-click on a Mac) on it and choosing "Adblock Image" from the pop-up menu. The ad simply disappears and never reappears with the same link again (you can also Adblock iframes). If the ad is a Flash movie, the pop-up menu doesn't work and instead you click on a small tab above or below the movie to block it. You can also block entire sites from sending ads (such as ad.doubleclick.net) so that you never get ads from them.

StumbleUpon is like channel-surfing for the web. You click a button and it sends you to a site that, based on your interests, you should like. Most of the time you do like it, and, if so, you click "I like it" on the toolbar (if you don't like it you click "Not-for-me"). You can also write comments on the site.

The ONLY thing I didn't like about Firefox was that when viewing java applets it often froze, but this may just be my computer acting up.

Firefox, as well as all of the Extensions and Themes, are FREE. Firefox is available for download HERE.

Today was my first day, and it was very tiring! First I went to singing class (I still don't know what I'm singing yet), then practiced Fughetta for an hour, then Molto Allegro. Then after lunch two very good ping-pong players came in and showed us how to really do ping-pong. They were on one volley for two whole minutes without stopping!

Then came the string orchestra class, lasting for two hours, where we practiced the last two pieces.

This is a great HTML-editing program. You can add tags by using the menu, and the tags are color-coded by type. It also has Preview and Live Preview modes.

Preview opens the default browser with the html you wrote (saved or unsaved) and Live Preview opens a new window with both the source code and what the web page actually looks like, and as you type the code above the text appears below (you can't edit the web page section directly, only the code, although you can use the text for the clipboard.

It also includes a handy color selector that automatically adds the color code into the html code (so you don't have to memorize things like "75c075" to get THIS color, etc.

6.26.2005

Tomorrow I'm going to music camp. It's quite fun, but it's also a workout. All you do the whole day is music, music, then lunch, then an activity, then more music. And it's every day for two whole weeks not counting the weekends!

But I like playing the violin, and so it's fun for me. More about music camp later.

Of all the symbols associated with Easter, the egg, the symbol of fertility and new life, is the most identifiable. The customs and traditions of using eggs have been associated with Easter for centuries.

Originally, Easter eggs were painted with bright colors to represent the sunlight of spring and were used in Easter-egg rolling contests or given as gifts. Later, they were colored and etched with various designs. The eggs were exchanged by lovers and romantic admirers, much the same as valentines. In medieval times eggs were traditionally given at Easter to the servants. In Germany eggs were given to children, along with other Easter gifts.

Different cultures have developed their own ways of decorating Easter eggs. Crimson eggs, to honor the blood of Christ, are exchanged in Greece. In parts of Germany and Austria, green eggs are used on Maundy Thursday (Holy Thursday). Slavic peoples decorate their eggs in special patterns of gold and silver.

Austrian artists design patterns by fastening ferns and tiny plants around the eggs, which are then boiled. The plants are then removed revealing a striking white pattern. The Poles and Ukrainians decorate eggs with simple designs and colors. A number of eggs are made in the distinctive manner called pysanki (to design, to write). Pysanki eggs are a masterpiece of skill and workmanship. Melted beeswax is applied to the fresh white egg. It is then dipped in successive baths of dye. After each dip, wax is painted over the area where the preceding color is to remain. Eventually a complex pattern of lines and colors emerges into a work of art.

In Germany and other countries, eggs used for cooking were not broken, but the contents were removed by piercing the end of each egg with a needle and blowing the contents into a bowl. The hollow eggs were then dyed, and hung from shrubs and trees during the Easter Week. The Armenians would decorate hollow eggs with pictures of Christ, the Virgin Mary, and other religious designs.

Bella loves to play in our yard, running back and forth until she’s exhausted. Well, one day she found an opening in the backyard and ran out. Mom and I were trying to catch her, but she was having way too much fun, free at last! Finally, I said the magic words: “You want a little something?” Bella stopped in her tracks and ran right to the door.

Thank goodness for treats!

What is KidsNews?

KidsNews is a free newsletter that I publish for my community. This post is here for the members the community to view.